Technology Simplified

The next generation of gaming is here with the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X — except it isn’t, because there are almost no next-generation games to play on them. Demon’s Souls is the first title that can truly be called next-gen, and it shows — even though it’s a remake of a PS3 game… which also shows. The original Demon’s Souls was an incredibly influential game. Its sequel, Dark Souls , was more popular and improved on the first quite a bit, but much of what made the now major series good had already been established. “Souls-like” is practically a genre now, though the originals are unsurprisingly still the nonpareil . The comparative few who played Demon’s Souls were elated to hear that it was being remade, and by Bluepoint at that (who also remade the legendary Shadow of the Colossus ), but worried that the game might not stand up by modern standards. Can an old game, the essentials of which are a decade behind its descendants, be given a really, really, really, ridiculo...

Nintendo will never stop mining its past for new nostalgia-based products, but at least it tends to do so with aplomb and occasionally even generosity. The former at least is on display with the Super Mario Bros. Game & Watch , a standalone handheld that plays the first Mario game, its unbelievably hard “Lost Levels” sequel, and acts as a totally impractical timepiece. This tiny gaming system isn’t the most practical thing in the world, but it is a charming piece of hardware that does exactly what it says on the tin. Turn on the Game & Watch with a button on the side and you can select between, naturally, the Game and Watch modes. In game mode, you can select between playing the original Super Mario Bros. for NES, the sequel we never got in the U.S., but was eventually released as “The Lost Levels,” and a recreation of an old-school LCD game where Mario juggles balls at ever-increasing speeds. Image Credits: Devin Coldewey / TechCrunch The screen, while certainly small,...

Buying someone a gadget is a time-honored tradition, but these days it can be particularly fraught, considering you may buy them a fitness tracker that also monitors emotions , or a doorbell that snitches to the cops . Mozilla has put together a helpful list of popular gadgets with ratings on just how creepy they are . “Privacy not included” has become an annual tradition for the internet rights advocate, and this year has an especially solid crop of creepy devices, given the uptick in smart speakers, smart security cameras and smart litterboxes. On the “creepy” end of the spectrum is… pretty much everything by Amazon except the Kindle. The devices in question send tons of data to Amazon by design, of course, but Mozilla feels the company hasn’t yet earned the trust to make that sort of thing acceptable. Facebook’s Portal earns a creepy spot for a similar reason. Image Credits: Mozilla Some random gadgets like a smart coffee maker and Moleskine smart notebook get creepy rating...

Amazon today announced a set of new features aimed at making its Alexa devices more useful to aging adults. With the launch of “ Care Hub, ” an added option in the Alexa mobile app, family members can keep an eye on older parents and loved ones, with their permission, in order to receive general information about their activities and to be alerted if the loved one has called out for help. The idea behind Care Hub, the company explains, is to offer reassurance to family members concerned about an elderly family member’s well-being, while also allowing those family members to maintain some independence. This is not a novel use case for Alexa devices. Already, the devices are being used in senior living centers and other care facilities , by way of third-party providers. K4Connect, a startup bringing tech to senior living centers, closes its $21M Series B Amazon stresses that while family members will be able to keep an eye on their loved ones’ Alexa use, it will respect their...

In the past several weeks we’ve seen refreshes and product expansions from about every facet of the smart home virtual assistant world. Apple launched the HomePod Mini, Google offered a long-overdue refresh of the Google Home and Amazon found even more speaker shapes to shove Alexa into. Today, we’re getting an addition from a startup competitor. Josh.ai has aimed to build out a niche in the space by building a smart assistant product that’s designed to be professionally installed alongside other smart home wares, and they announced a new product this afternoon. The device, Josh Nano, fully buys into a more luxury home-focused niche with a low-profile device that appears to be a little bit bigger than a half-dollar, though the bulk of the device is embedded into the wall itself and wired back to a central unit via power-over-ethernet. The device bundles a set of four microphones eschewing any onboard speaker, instead opting to integrate directly with a user’s at-home sound system....

In addition to the MacBook Air , Apple also introduced a new Mac Mini. It runs Apple’s first custom chipset specifically designed for Mac computers, the M1. It still features the same familiar design, but it now uses an Arm-based chip. “If you compare a Mac mini to the top-selling desktop in this price range, the Mini is one-tenth its size and yet it’s up to five times faster,” Hardware Engineering Senior Manager Julie Broms said. The M1 features four high-performance cores and four high-efficiency cores. It uses a 5nm process. There are eight GPU cores with 128 execution units, which should lead to peak performance of 2.6 teraflops. There is also Apple’s neural engine for machine learning tasks. According to Apple, the new Mac Mini is up to three times faster than the previous model when it comes to CPU performance. As for GPU performance, it is up to six times faster. ML acceleration is also up to 15 times faster. At the back of the device, you’ll find an Ethernet port, two T...

Apple’s upcoming desktop and laptop operating system, macOS Big Sur, will be released on November 12, the company announced today. macOS Big Sur — which stays with the company’s California-themed naming scheme — will arrive with a new and refreshed user interface, new features, and performance improvements. Much of the features in iOS 14 are porting over — including improved Message threading and in-line replies and a redesigned Maps app. The new Apple software also comes with a new Control Center, with quick access to brightness, volume, Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth. Safari also gets a much needed lick of paint. It comes with new privacy and security features, including an in-built intelligence tracking prevention that stops trackers following you across the web, and password monitoring to save you from using previously breached passwords. If you’re wondering what macOS Big Sir is like to work on, TechCrunch’s Brian Heater took the new software for a spin in August. macOS Big Sur will...

One of the problems with putting a satellite in orbit is that once you do, it’s pretty much out of your hands. If anything goes wrong, or it runs out of fuel, that’s all she wrote. Fortunately there are companies that aim to change this, and three leaders in the field — Orbit Fab, Astroscale, and Maxar — will be joining us at TC Sessions: Space in December . Also at TC Sessions: Space Lockheed Martin VP Lisa Callahan Rocket Lab’s Peter Beck US Space Force Lt. General John F. Thompson Will Roper, Assistant Secretary, Air Force Read the agenda You may remember Orbit Fab from Disrupt’s Startup Battlefield around this time last year. CEO and co-founder Daniel Faber debuted its refueling interface , RAFTI, and showed how that and a network of “tanker” satellites could save companies hundreds of millions by keeping their spacecraft in orbit rather than sending up replacements. Astroscale is embarking on a similar effort for satellites in geosynchronous orbits, which are even mo...

Apple is organizing its third event in three months today. The company is holding a (virtual) keynote at 10 AM PT (1 PM in New York, 6 PM in London, 7 PM in Paris) . And you’ll be able to watch the event right here as the company is streaming it live. Apple has already announced at its developer conference that there would be a new Mac with an ARM-based processor this year. So today’s event seems like the perfect opportunity to introduce a new computer with Apple’s own processor. Similarly, we’ll likely find out when macOS Big Sur is going to be released. The new major update is likely to ship with the new Apple computer. Apple could also use this opportunity for other, smaller announcements. Let’s see if the company has some new accessories to show off. You can watch the live stream directly on this page, as Apple is streaming its conference on YouTube. If you have an Apple TV, you don’t need to download a new app. You can open the Apple TV app and find the Apple Events sectio...

Brynn Putnam has a lot to feel great about. A Harvard grad and former professional ballet dancer who opened the first of what have become three high-intensity fitness studios in New York, she then launched a second business in 2016 when — while pregnant with her son — she was exercising at home and couldn’t find a natural way watch a class on her laptop or phone. Her big idea: to install a mirrored screen in users’ homes that’s roughly eight square feet and through which they could exercise along to all manner of streamed and on-demand exercise classes through a subscription package costing just $39 per month. If you’ve followed the home fitness craze, you may know already that idea, Mirror, quickly took off with celebrities, who gushed about the product on social media. The company also attracted roughly $75 million in venture funding across several fast rounds. Indeed, by the end of last year, people had bought  “tens of thousands” of Mirrors, according to Putnam, and she was ...

Bill Zhang lowered himself into lunges on a squishy mat as he explained to me the benefits of the full-body training suit he was wearing. We were in his small, modest office in Xili, a university area in Shenzhen that’s also home to many hardware makers. The connected muscle stimulator attached to the suit, called Balanx, is designed to bring so-called electronic muscle stimulation, which is said to help improve metabolism and burn fat. “We are not really aiming at Chinese consumers at this point,” said Zhang, who started Balanx in 2014. “The suit is for the more savvy consumers in the West.” Prospects for hardware makers were looking bright until two years ago when the Trump administration began setting trade barriers on China. Relations between the two countries have been deteriorating over a series of flashpoint events, from Beijing’s policy on Hong Kong to the coronavirus pandemic . Chinese entrepreneurs don’t expect relationships between the countries to warm up anytime so...

Sony has announced that it is entering the drone market with a new brand called Airpeak, though the specifics of the drone itself are left something of a mystery. It plans to launch the project next spring. The barebones announcement says only that Sony has been inspired by the “recent proliferation” of drones and the changes they have caused in both the industrial and creative sectors. Airpeak will focus on multiple industries as well, though it has its work cut out for it if it intends to go up against DJI, which has become the first choice in the consumer UAV sector. Sony describes the drone as being developed within “the field of AI robotics,” which, along with the aim to enable drone use where it was previously difficult to do so, suggests Sony plans to integrate a fair amount of intelligence into the drones’ systems. Small UAVs have gotten smarter and smarter, able now to avoid obstacles, recognize other flying objects, and navigate between buildings without any interventi...